


Parallel

by epersonae



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: F/M, Memory, Stolen Century Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-03
Updated: 2017-12-03
Packaged: 2019-02-09 23:10:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12898857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epersonae/pseuds/epersonae
Summary: Five times they nearly touched, five moments of connection forgotten, and a final moment when everything comes back together.





	Parallel

[tea]

When they first met her, she was stern, almost regal, but he caught the hint of a smile, somewhere in the corner of her eyes. Just as quickly as he spied it, though, the smile vanished: when she wouldn’t tell them her name. Madame Director, that’s all. A title, a role, a distance. The sadness only intensified when Taako called himself an idiot, and he instantly regretted the moment when he agreed. As he recovered from that, the only thing he could think to do is to offer to have some tea, but that didn’t quite land. Her stern mask was back even more than before, with a touch of offense about her age.

On the other hand, as she tapped her staff to start the test of initiation (“you are knee-deep in test-town”) he saw — thought he saw, would’ve sworn he’d seen — a glimmer of that smile again.

 //

“There's no godsdamned tea left!” he bellowed, voice echoing through the IPRE cafeteria.

“Jeezy creezy, just have some coffee,” said one of the twins.

“And then take it down about 500 notches? I mean, do you even _need_ the caffeine?” said the other.

“But I wanted _tea_ ,” he said, slamming a mug down on the countertop probably a little too hard to be safe for either the counter or the mug.

“I have some,” she said in a small voice, nervous about intruding. She opened her messenger bag: blue canvas with a spare mission patch sewn onto it. Inside, a pair of notebooks, an astonishing array of pens, and a half-dozen tea bags. “Chamomile, green, or oolong?”

He smiled, huge like the sun. She looked back down into her bag as if still searching for the tea.

“Oolong, deffo,” he said.

 

[slap]

As the cacophony faded, he looked around to see if anyone else had stayed conscious. Nope. Just the three of them, everyone else at the Bureau knocked out cold.

Except for the Director, who was slowly struggling to her feet. She looked disoriented, but more than that: frightened. He knew that look from some of the kids at Ravens Roost, when they realized what they were facing down and how bad it might be. There wasn't much you could do for them, but you could at least startle them back into the moment with a little slap across the face.

He felt awkward about for maybe a second, especially as her eyes narrowed, staring him down. But before he could say a word, her hand landed on his face.

“Booyah.”

 //

She came to in that same dizzy way, feeling her body reform in the same damn spot. Looking across the deck to everyone else doing the same. Magnus wincing at the reformed black eye.

He took a deep breath and smiled. The air around them was clear and fresh for the first time in a year.

Lup and Taako both rushed forward and buried him in one of their famous twin hugs while Barry clapped him on the back with a nod. Merle tried to do the same but ended up more or less patting Magnus’s butt; both of them laughed. Davenport just gave the tiniest stern nod.

When the twins had disengaged, he threw open his arms to Lucretia. She stepped forward, blinking tears out of her eyes, and she reached up and slapped him across the face, nearly catching the edge of the black eye.

“Hey? The hell?”

“Don’t do that again,” she said. “Just...don’t.”

 

[hug]

She so obviously needed a hug. The iron in her spine had turned brittle and hard. Something glittered in her eyes: tears maybe? And he realized that Bain had probably been a friend. Someone she trusted enough to inoculate and then go back to live as if nothing had happened, just watching and waiting. Were they friends? Or more? When had she seen him last? But there was none of that in her words, no acknowledgement of feeling or loss. Just something in her stance, her face, just something he could sense even across the room.

But as soon as he reached out, she put out her hand. No. Without a word, barely even a gesture; he knew both that she would not accept a hug and that she definitely needed one. He didn’t know how he knew, so: “offer’s on the table.”

 //

While the others went on a futile final search for the Light, she stayed with him in Legato. He led her into the mountain, introduced her to Fischer. The creature had been so shy at first. She knew what it was to be that shy, and she knew what it was like to open up under Magnus’s attention. So she felt a kinship to it almost immediately, sketching as it played with the wooden ducks that Magnus whittled. It played with her, it splashed her, waved the ducks at her with its long tendrils, and though she knew -- they all knew the horrorshow that was on the verge of unfolding -- she still treasured a moment, a few moments of kindness.

Together, as the columns of opalescent darkness descended, together they fought their way into the mountain. Together they begged Fischer to come with them. Together they pleaded with all the creatures. Finally, fighting their way back out, Fischer in tow, they barely made it to the ship at all. As the blackness closed around them, they exchanged one last look. Would they make it? What would remain when the silver threads reform?

Fischer floated amongst them on the deck, bobbing and dancing, trilling happily.

Without a word Magnus opened his arms; without a word she collapsed against his chest, her head on his shoulder. Tears formed in her eyes, the same tears in his: something, something had survived, something would persist, something more these drifting seven souls.

 

[backrub]

He worked the last layer of varnish into the chairs for Merle and Taako. He was putting in toilet seats as a joke, but he was still going to put his best craftsmanship into it in any case. Just six months, and these guys had become the closest friends he'd had since, well, since the day he'd headed to Neverwinter with a rocking chair.

He'd thought for a second about making a rocking chair for the Director, but that felt too odd. She seemed touchy about her age, when he'd offered her tea, and besides, a chair was an awfully personal gift. What do you get for your boss? What do you get for your boss when you don't even know her name?

 //

“I’m sorry,” he said for about the seventeenth time. “I’m sorry you had to be alone for so long. I’m sorry I couldn’t keep my mouth shut for like 10 goddamn minutes.”

She shrugged. He needed to say it. She didn’t really need to hear it anymore.

“Taako said everybody else got turned into a statue anyway.”

“Yeah but….”

“There was nothing you could do.”

He sighed and frowned. He picked up a piece of wood and his penknife again, angrily flicking bits of wood off of the block.

“You’re going to cut yourself, whittling when you’re mad,” she said.

“I’m not mad.”

She hummed noncommittally. Fischer floated over, humming a similar noise.

“See, Fischer agrees with me. If you’re so sorry, put that down and give me a backrub?”

He smiled, put down the knife and the block of wood, and came over to rest his hands on her shoulders. She sighed, leaning into him, and he kissed the top of her head.

 

[separation]

He was tangled in the tendrils of the voidfish, tangled in visions he couldn’t quite understand. Nothing made sense anymore. What is the past? What is _his_ past? He doubted everything, couldn’t believe anything, couldn’t trust anything, couldn’t….

And to the voidfish, this strange eldritch memory-eating creature, he asked, “Should I trust the Director?”

There was no answer.

 //

He wasn’t on her side. He didn’t have her back at all. “We’ll try your plan if this doesn’t work.” That wasn’t good enough. It’s not like it would have changed anything: the others had all made up their minds. Barry and Lup, their plan was going to come first. Lup and Barry, they’d been able to make their case, and she hadn’t. She’d failed. And even Magnus. Not even Magnus had stood up for her idea.

She shut her door and sat at her desk, bare of journals and pens, just her wand, which she picked up and held close to her chest. With a soft murmur, she cast her shield. The translucent bubble spread around her. Inside of it, she practiced her breathing, tried to clear her mind, push away the frustration and hurt that clawed at her. Light filled the bubble and pulsed around her.

Patience, she thought, patience.

 

[reconciliation]

There is always a third option. The relics are no more. The barrier comes down.

The barrier comes down and the face of Madam Director is broken open, is Lucretia again. Her face is open, and he remembers it. Their hearts are open, and then his arms around her, and all their friends together.

They know the past: they can see a future. They’re going to win.


End file.
